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Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Barney Frank is apologizing for an off-handed comment he made about the Trayvon Martin case during a graduation ceremony Sunday. “You now have a hoodie you can wear and no one will shoot at you,” Frank said after black civil rights leader Hubie Jones received a hooded academic robe as part of an honorary degree awarded by the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. “I think you’ll feel pretty protected by that,” Frank added. The comment drew groans from the crowd.

As tax rates go up, people look for ways to minimize their tax burden. The migration out of high-tax states to lower tax states is further augmented by the demographic shifts now occurring, as baby boomers reach retirement age and move to locales in which they can keep more of what they have.

Twenty weeks marks a crucial point in a pregnancy, when fetal abnormalities can be detected, often for the first time. Many women confronted with a grim prenatal diagnosis choose to have an abortion. Now, in Arizona, they can’t.

As the latest maneuver to undermine the protections of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion until at least 24 weeks, the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child” model has been gaining popularity. Nebraska was the first state to pass such a law in 2010; Idaho, Iowa, Alabama, Oklahoma, Indiana, and Kansas followed, as did Georgia in March (though lawmakers there agreed to allow abortion if the fetus has “a congenital or chromosomal anomaly that is incompatible with life”). Legislators in West Virginia, Kentucky, Louisiana, New Hampshire, Arkansas, and Mississippi are considering similar laws. Representative Trent Franks of Arizona has even authored one for the District of Columbia.

No scientific evidence exists to support the idea that a fetus can feel pain at 20 weeks. (Or in Arizona’s case, 18 weeks, as the law uniquely starts counting from the first day of a woman’s last menstrual period, which is typically two weeks before fertilization.) The part of the brain that registers such a sensation doesn’t develop until much later.

“There have been a lot of impassioned speeches from my Republican colleagues about the significance of a child’s life regardless of their disability, and about the value of human life,” says Arizona House Minority Leader Chad Campbell, a Phoenix Democrat. “But when they do a budget, it doesn’t include the concern for human life they talk about all the time.” The Children’s Health Insurance Program remains but with enrollment frozen as of January 2010. In 2008, KidsCare covered close to 65,000 children; now it serves 14,000. The waiting list for the program has grown to more than 100,000.

State Representative Kimberly Yee, a Republican from the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, sponsored the post-20-week abortion ban along with many other restrictions on women’s reproductive rights. She has also defended health-care cuts since she took office last year.

It’s tasteless and insensitive. But not explicitly racist. The fact that this distinction might elude us says a lot about why we struggle to come to grips with our own racism. Just the fact that Hubie Jones is African American does not automatically mean that any insensitive remark directed toward him is racist.

Think about it for just a second. Frank’s remark points out in real terms the basic concern that most enlightened people have with the Martin case. When it comes to violence and law enforcement in our country, innocent African Americans and other non-whites are treated very, very differently than innocent whites. And the daily risk of violence at the hands of aggressive authorities that innocent African American males face is a fact not lost on Professor Jones.

Jones may not appreciate sarcastic jokes about it. But the fact that the comment is sarcastic, and that the sarcasm is directed at the white racist system that exposes African American males like Professor Jones to daily threats of violence is a lot more significant than Professor Jones’ race.

Sure, it was a terribly inappropriate comment. It is insensitive to the family of the slain innocent boy and to their community. And it diminishes the solemnity of an occasion to honor a wonderful man like Professor Jones. But in terms of racism it doesn’t even come close to selling rifle targets featuring the likeness of the dead boy. Frank’s comment makes light of the fact that our legal system routinely exposes innocent African Americans to threats of real violence. The other suggests that it is “fun sport” to shoot innocent young African American males. One of these things is not like the other. Get it?

Over the weekend their was a case of Public Employees saving a life that will probably not make much more news. On Saturday, the crew of the ferry Wenatchee on it’s run to Bainbridge Island jumped into action when they saw that a passenger had either jumped or fell overboard. The rescue boat(all the ferries in the fleet have them) was launched, and they got the person out of the water quickly. This is not necessarily going the extra mile, it’s one of the additional duties deckhands aboard WSF boats have. There job is not just the safe and timely passage of people and vehicles across the sound, but also responding to maritime emergencies that cross their path. Sometimes a Washington State Ferry might be the only boat in the area able to respond, as the Coast Guard can’t be everywhere, and as for fireboats, I don’t know how many departments have them on Puget Sound, but I know Tacoma has 2 and the SFD has 3.

Anybody catch this over the weekend? Germany was producing nearly 50% of their national power needs from solar. ‘Course the only way to lower America’s dependence on foreign oil is drilling. Drill here, drill more have zero effect in the commodities market.

I would not be surprised. Germany was on the way to going back on that last year, if it were not for(sorry for this term being used, in advance) fallout from the Fukishima disaster in Japan. A political shift happened in Germany, at the state level. The coalition partner at the Federal Level in Berlin for the ruling Christian Democratic Party, the Free Democratic Party(my best interpretation of their platform, more like our Libertarian Party) was pushing them towards ending the Social Democratic/Green Party phase-out of Germany’s Nuclear Power plants. In several state elections, the Free Democrats failed to get even 5% of the party vote, which under the German electoral system, means no seats in the legislature for your party(in the Bundestag, their is a loophole, need to win in three district seats), under their Mixed Member Proportional Representation system. The biggest surprise in the backlash, was a more conservative state, Baden-Wurtenberg(capital Stuttgart), the CDU/FDP government lost the election where the Green Party came in ahead, and for the first time, was asking the Social Democratic Party to be their junior partner. Baden-Wurtenmberg was home to 4 Nuclear Powerplants. Compromise happens all the time under the German system.

This Germany solar shit drives me up the wall because almost every Seattle solar company mentions Germany and how Seattle gets more sun than Germany. Ergo, it’s a great idea to install solar in Seattle, right?

Reality:

Germany was heavily subsidized, which is why so many solar sites were installed there.

In the past couple of months, Germany decided the subsidy was unsustainable and essentially pulled the plug on the program.

Finally:

That 50% number was a one-day production number. Probably everything was perfect weatherwise, and sun level, etc.

Overall Germany gets 4% of its energy from solar.

Solar is only viable because of the subsidies. Otherwise payback is 1% per year, before maintenance and repair costs.

Now, the Prius, on the other hand………….

Toyota’s engineers should get a Nobel for something. VW’s TDI is a close second.

I think we would be much better off, environmentally, if we subsidized more efficient gas-powered vehicles than if we continued to dump money into solar and wind.

Something that did not get much press last week, an American-flagged merchant ship came under attack by pirates, and the private security guards(but following Coast Guard rules of engagement) repelled the attack. WHat is conflicting in the reports, was the assistance given by a certain Middle East nation that to say we are not on good relations with is an understatement. One report said that the Iranians helped the crew of the Maersk Texas over the radio, another report(of course Tehran would say this) said they were on the scene. Anyway, a few months ago, we helped rescue Iranian fisherman from pirates, so they could be returning to favor.

As for the protecting merchant ships from pirates, might be time to bring back the Navy Armed Guard units of WWII that provided the heavy firepower aboard Liberty Ships. The new gun the Coast Guard and US Navy is deploying on select new warships, has some ammo that would definitely give pirates in skiffs and small boats a reason to run. Fires rounds that can be pre-programmed for airburst. Although having the private security guards the Maersk Texas did have, is pushing a gray area of Maritime Law already.

Oil isn’t subsidized? There’s enough sun in eastern Washington to take Spokane off the grid for a few weeks a year. Large scale solar is feasible for most of the southwest. San Francisco, not known for sunny weather, powers their convention center largely through solar.

Yet another left-wing whackjob has to eat a shit sandwich for opening his yap before engaging his brain. Seems to be more & more commonplace-

The MSNBC host, who on the eve of Memorial Day said it makes him “uncomfortable” to describe fallen soldiers as heroes, apologized Monday after outcry from a top veterans group. “On Sunday, in discussing the uses of the word “hero” to describe those members of the armed forces who have given their lives, I don’t think I lived up to the standards of rigor, respect and empathy for those affected by the issues we discuss that I’ve set for myself,” Chris Hayes, host of “Up With Chris Hayes,” said in a statement. “I am deeply sorry for that.”

The Children’s Health Insurance Program remains but with enrollment frozen as of January 2010. In 2008, KidsCare covered close to 65,000 children; now it serves 14,000. The waiting list for the program has grown to more than 100,000.

Was Staff Sgt. Robert Bales a hero on March 10th? Or was he always something else and that only became apparent on March 11th? Or, if he changed, did the change come over him gradually? And at what point during the change did he stop being a hero?

Sure, Chris Hayes ought to know better in his business. But he might be doing us all a favor by encouraging us to re-examine our relationship with war, and war fighters. Is all warfare heroic? Are all war fighters heroes? If we adopt those axioms what outcomes can we expect?

There job is not just the safe and timely passage of people and vehicles across the sound, but also responding to maritime emergencies that cross their path. Sometimes a Washington State Ferry might be the only boat in the area able to respond, as the Coast Guard can’t be everywhere, and as for fireboats, I don’t know how many departments have them on Puget Sound, but I know Tacoma has 2 and the SFD has 3.

I bet you won’t read that in right wing degenerate Pooper Scott’s “Ferry Tales” or any of the other crap dug up by right wing stink tanks and fed to hack tv pseudo-journalists.

Solar is only viable because of the subsidies. Otherwise payback is 1% per year, before maintenance and repair costs. You got links for that or are you must making that up?

“Increasing the amount of solar power on the grid has actually lowered peak electricity prices (How the merit order effect works) but it has generated a backlash among German utilities, who are having their bottom line hurt by solar competition….”

The reason [Solar] can’t compete, yet, is partly because every other form of energy is heavily subsidized as well and partly because true, industry-wide economies of scale haven’t truly kicked in yet. Coal, oil, natural gas, hydro electric, nuclear… all of those industries get money from the government and lots of it. Solar companies would love a level playing field, either remove the subsidies from the competitors (not realistic), or give us a taste. Solar really only needs a little, and the ideal model is based on a feed-in tariff so the subsidies are power output driven. Traditional energy also has decades, in some cases, centuries of industry establishment, solar is catching up, but it’ll take another few years.http://morgansolar.wordpress.com/solar-myths/

@20. Not sure your point since your history of rah-rah-war-on-terror is pretty well documented.

Sure, the article is upsetting to the pacifist wing of Obama’s base. But how do you propose we “win” the so-called War on Terror. Is the goal to pacify every rock-thrower and suicide bomber before we declare victory and stop spending lives and treasure in the pursuit? Maybe we can ask the Israelis how long that might take?

Or is the goal to determine who are the leadership of actual terrorist organizations and eliminate them? If that’s the end-game, a president who ultimately wants to consider the case against the accused and calculate if the collateral deaths of others is appropriate for the target value of each individual and then stand behind the decision is a bad thing?

Would you be happier if the buck stopped with a General or two rather than the Commander in Chief? Or were you pointing out something that you admire about President Obama, guffaw….

Domestic drilling is up, and in the case of Alaska, recently at Valdez there was a surprise delivery, a tanker returned to Valdez full of crude oil, because it had nowhere to offload down here. The Cherry Point refinery, the largest in Washington State, is still not back up to full capacity since the fire.

INTERNMENT – performed by a DUMMOCRAPTIC knee-jerk reactive president.

Sadly, true. And so predictable that you would sputter that out. Do you suppose, had he won in 1940, that Wendell Willkie would have acted any differently, any more heroically, in terms of defending the civil rights of minorities?

Why did the hearings come to Seattle? Some speculated that Governor Hart’s term was nearly up, and the Republican-led committee timed the hearings to garner support for his November re-election bid.[7] It was Seattle’s Anti-Japanese League, however, waged the campaign to extend the congressional hearings to Washington.

The League was primarily comprised of members of the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, and Washington State’s Veteran’s Welfare Commission (VFW). The Anti-Japanese League was founded in 1916 by former Washington State legislator and director of the local United States Naval training facility, Miller Freeman. Freeman was the League’s president at the time of the congressional hearings.

Miller Freeman, who made a fortune stealing the land from Japanese farmers in concentration camps – and passed that fortune onto notorious Republican land-developer and sugar-daddy to Timmeh Eyman, Kemper Freeman.

@37 Holy shit, thanks for the history lesson. The past really is never over, is it? Some cocksucker makes his fortune stealing a lot of land from hard-working Japanese immigrants, and his sons and grandsons are still living on and multiplying that ill-gotten wealth over half a century later.

Another fact courtesy of History Link: the patriarch of this clan of thieves, Legh Richmond Freeman, was a soldier in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. I wonder if that had anything to do with his son Miller’s apparent racism, and his willingness to profit by stealing what others had built through hard work?

“A 14-year-old girl was in her bedroom when she heard someone else in the house. She left the bedroom and went to the kitchen where she discovered a naked man stealing a bottle of rum. The girl ran to take refuge in her bedroom and listened as the man, 47-year-old Kennan Kluesener, made a phone call before leaving the house. A neighbor saw Kluesener in the front yard of the home and retirieved his gun. He was then able to detain Kluesener at gunpoint until the police arrived. (Naples Daily News, Naples, FL, 2/23/12)”

re 43: Most people wouldn’t need a gun to detain a naked man armed with a bottle of rum. Now, if he had Skittles and some canned ices tea and was wearing a hoodie (and was black, some say you might require a firearm.

re 43: Most people wouldn’t need a gun to detain a naked man armed with a bottle of rum. Now, if he had Skittles, some canned iced tea and was wearing a hoodie (and was black, some say you might require a firearm.

Sadly, true.[standard useless gibberish – skipped] Do you suppose, had he won in 1940, that Wendell Willkie would have acted any differently, any more heroically, in terms of defending the civil rights of minorities?

Does this moron know his history? Nope cuz he’s a dope!

Well well well, more deflection and blame. Since it was a DUMMOCRAPTIC Congress for the 1939-1946, who knows how the racist DUMMOCRAPTS in the House and Senate would have reacted. Besides Willkie was a DUMMOCRAPT until TVA was enacted! He was the dark horse candidate because of a split Republican party! Afterward he went back to being a DUMMOCRAPT.

An Ohio student threatened with suspension for wearing a t-shirt saying, “Jesus Is Not A Homophobe,” which the school characterized as a “sexual” message, has won a federal lawsuit on free speech grounds.

@46 You completely failed to address Miller Freeman, grandfather of the Eyman-underwriting Kemper Freeman and founder of their fortune, amassed in part by stealing the land owned by a minority group sent to concentration camps.

# 11: Right wingers and the local TV news like to criticize ferry workers as “overpaid & underworked”, especially when they only see those directing traffic in ferry lanes. But they forget that is an entry-level job to becoming a deck-hand. And a deck hand is a able-bodied seaman required to conduct themsleves on the high seas as any able-bodied seaman upon open water.

Oh BTW Lib da moron, WA State isn’t known around the world for Japanese INTERNMENT, WA DC is. It was run by DUMMOCRAPTS. When you visit Tokyo (I go at least once per year) they don’t bring up WA State… it’s WA DC ya moron!

@55 Republicans love to denigrate workers – by devaluing them it makes it easier to pay them less, or nothing. As RR has said, what the right wing is about is free labor – serfdom for all of us.

I doubt that there is any trivial job on one of those big boats. Water and large boats are inherently dangerous, and their cargo are hundreds of landlubbers and their cars – if that crew is not prepared for all sorts of complex situations, real tragedy would ensue.

You completely failed to address Miller Freeman, grandfather of the Eyman-underwriting Kemper Freeman and founder of their fortune, amassed in part by stealing the land owned by a minority group sent to concentration camps.

How do you address an untruth? FACTS!And what’s interesting is how Bill Gates decided to build MSFT in that area!

Oh BTW Lib da moron, WA State isn’t known around the world for Japanese INTERNMENT, WA DC is. It was run by DUMMOCRAPTS. When you visit Tokyo (I go at least once per year) they don’t bring up WA State… it’s WA DC ya moron!

Whatever, puddles – you’re a sick, twisted little man.

****

One of may patients told me a story – he’s in his 80’s, Japanese-American. His family had a big truck farm in Renton – taken away from them in 1942, I believe. He was trucked to the Assembly Center in Puyallup, and then to Tulelake, in a bleak part of Northern California. That camp help 18789 American citizens at its height. Many of the rest of the Washington State residents – 7200 – were shipped from Puyallup to to Minidoka, in Idaho, another bleak corner of the Great Basin.

Washington state was in the thick of anti-Japanese crimes and slurs, and local right-winger’s grand-daddy and source of his fortune was a leader of the Anti-Jap League.

Face facts puddles, and stop diminishing yourself even further, if that were possible.

Even despite the prevalence of anti-Japanese sentiments in Bellevue, incarcerated Japanese Americans were able to return to their homes. However, out 60 of the original Nikkei families, only 11 returned. Those who returned faced intense discrimination and resistance, including the burning of several homes of prominent Japanese community members[2]. Fallow fields, stolen equipment and harsh winter months forced many Japanese farmers to sell their land. The once prosperous Japanese American farming community had essentially died.

“[Miller Freeman] and his son and grandson (developed) Bellevue Square, the Hyatt Regency. Just recently, his grandson wrote a, published a book about the family. And he has, I think one or two pages about the Japanese people, about how his father respected the Japanese people. I mean, it was not true. But in reading this book (…) I was just incredulous to read that in 1980s when they needed money for the Hyatt Regency, they sought out Japanese money. Itochu, you’ve heard of the Ito Company? It’s one of the conglomerates of Japan. They provided a lot of the money, because Japan was booming at that time. And I couldn’t believe it. I think I lent you the book. So I’ll show the picture of the ribbon-cutting, of these Japanese representatives, and the wife is in the kimono. And oh my goodness, if (they) only knew about, about the family and how much they hated the Japanese.” Sumie Seguro Akizuki, Courtesy Densho Digital Archive, 2008

# 42: As the great-grandson of at least one Confederate soldier, I would hate to think that my views on race extended that far. I do think it’s more likely to be acquired by more recent generations (i.e., father and his siblings).

But F.D.R’s internment order didn’t come out of the blue. It was a by-product of the commander of the west coast, Gen. John L. Dewitt, who irratationally claimed that the absence of any proven incidents of espionage or sabotage was only proof that such espionage or sabotage actually existed. It was on DeWitt’s claim that Japanese on the West Coast were assisting Japanese planes and subs prepare for an invasion that F.D.R. signed the internment order, which DeWitt enthusiastically enforced. No such order existed on the east coast where a real threat existed from German subs, although the internment of German and Italian civilians was rather selective.

Later, Simon Boliver Buckner Jr. (son of Confederate general Simon Boliver Buckner Sr. who gained fame when he surrendered Ft. Donaldson to U.S. Grant) was put in charge of defenses of Alaska and the building of the Trans-Siberian Railroad. He prohibited the mingling if native Alaskan and black troops sent to build the lifeline, making some pretty racist comments in the process. He is known for his racist treatmenet of black solders who helped build the pipeline. Like his father, he gained a bit of infamy – Jr. did’t surrender Alaska, but he did become the highest-ranking U.S. general to die in combat in WWII when he was shot by a Japanese sniper on Okinawa (he had campaigned long and hard for a combat assignment before the war ended).

DeWitt was sent on to guard the Aeutions, where he campaigned for the better part of two years to have it taken back from Japanese invaders who had seized two islands as a diversion to the Midway operation. DeWitt argued that the Aleutions could serve as a stepping-stone to a northern route for the invasion of Japan, which would pose as a logistical nightmare for that purpose. DeWitt finally was given enough rope to invade the two islands, which resulted in more dead from friendly fire than from opposing fire.

piddly’s off track again. Sequence, discussion centers around the Japanese experience around Puget sound. Piddly deflects to it’s DCs fault ’cause no one talks about WA state in Japan. Piddly fails to recognize rhetorical question and quotes excerpt about the experience of Japanese around Puget Sound forgetting that he claimed no one cares about WA State only a few minutes prior.

But F.D.R’s internment order didn’t come out of the blue. It was a by-product of the commander of the west coast, Gen. John L. Dewitt, who irratationally claimed that the absence of any proven incidents of espionage or sabotage was only proof that such espionage or sabotage actually existed. It was on DeWitt’s claim that Japanese on the West Coast were assisting Japanese planes and subs prepare for an invasion that F.D.R. signed the internment order, which DeWitt enthusiastically enforced. No such order existed on the east coast where a real threat existed from German subs, although the internment of German and Italian civilians was rather selective.

Very interesting, rhp. None of that could have happened, of course, without the poisonous racism on the ground – stoked by people like Miller Freeman and the Washington Anti-Japanese League.

So refreshing to have people post with facts and insights – puddles leaves far too many farts, and no facts.

@59, you should realize that when you persist in misusing common terms of the English language it doesn’t somehow shift or cloud the true meaning of those words or distract from previous misuse.

It just makes you appear stupid. The more you do it, the more stupid you appear to everyone else. Insisting that you are right doesn’t make everyone else wrong. You are probably just experiencing another episode of hypomania.

For what it’s worth: using “google” as a verb, as in – “Puddy is now going to google the word ‘neologism'” – is an example of a neologism.

Perhaps in your case an alternate meaning for the word might be more appropriate. Some psychiatric clinicians use the term in their diagnostic notes as shorthand to describe novel forms of language employed by schizophrenics. Though this isn’t really a correct use, in your case it just might fit.

@71 Yeah, in retrospect, my assertion on that count was completely out of line. Sins are not passed from father to son, after all. Not everyone in the Confederate Army joined because of slavery (although a lot of them did, and ultimately that is what they were fighting for), and while their cause was shit, the Army of Northern Virginia was one of the finest military organizations this country has ever known, and their ability to outfight a larger and better-equipped army is impressive. As for Legh Richmond Freeman, he at least seems to have been an industrious and hard-working man, and the fact that he left the South and eventually settled in the Northwest seems to indicate that he wanted to start life fresh somewhere else.

Thank you for the elucidating history lesson. I really ought to study this stuff in closer detail. The idea of invading Japan by way of the Aleutians is kind of silly.

The rhetorical question was whether the interned went home to a well known neighborhood in our nation’s capitol and found their land, uhm, collected and redistributed. I know, I’m operating on the assumption that you know squat about DC. Sorry to confuse you.

As for power subsidies, I could have kept flogging that equine corpse long after anyone else cared or I could roll with the new O.T. topic without contradicting myself. You should try it.

Wow, more than one conherent thought at a time. You should try it. Ah! I made a joke. You’d need to stay coherent on one first.

The whole question is, “How did Noah keep the volociraptors from eating the Emperor Penguins?”

It’s a joke on multiple levels, but it essentially points out the ludicrousness of Biblical literalism, and Young Earth Creationism and the denial of evolution in particular and science in general. It is a joke that repeatedly points out what a complete loon you are.

I’m stunned you never got it – you really do have some significant parts of your psyche missing, or something.

@87 I believe that construction, “Anti-Jap League” was the custom at the time, particularly among the racist, and I used it thusly for effect, underscoring my critique of racists. Hope it was understood that way.

Hmmm….Mark Zuckerberg wears a hoodie, and I don’t see anyone shooting at him. Mind you, if Facebook’s stock keeps spiraling toward worthlessness if I were him I’d be on the lookout for disgruntled investors.

“How did Noah keep the velociraptors from eating the Emperor Penguins?”

In that context it doesn’t appear to be a neologism. None of the words by themselves fit the proper definition. Nor would the phrase “Velociraptors eating Emperor Penguins” misquoted from the original post constitute a neologism. It’s a one-off. It neither seeks to establish novel meaning nor does it have the potential. Perhaps if it were some HA form of Cockney slang intended to mean something else. But it really means just that: vicious predatory prehistoric dinosaurs eating flightless Antarctic birds. And that’s how it was used. So, pretty much not a neologism.

While I’m certain that there may be a great many very smart people in whatever industry employs the Pudster, and undoubtedly those people use neologisms frequently, I don’t see how that consequently leads to a conclusion that Pud understands all of the words he repeats back to other posters. Clearly his usage here and elsewhere provides ample evidence to the contrary.

Frankly, whether Pud is a licensed engineer in the “computer industry” or a janitorial engineer in the “computer industry” there’s nothing particular odd about a limited vocab in this day and age. What fascinates me is his insistent determination to prove the rest of the English speaking world wrong whenever his vocab fails him. He clearly has a very colorful grasp of English grammar and enjoys making up a great many unique homographs and using them liberally (npi) in his posts. More specifically he seems to enjoy using non-standard dialect and seems to do more of it whenever his rhetoric becomes heated or confrontational. In that context it seems to me that Pud’s vocab misuse by frequently and repeatedly “regurgitating” words back at other posters without necessarily understanding them is like a defense mech. I suppose he hopes to defuse the potential power of these words by repeating them back improperly again and again.

But Pud’s use of non-standard dialect in written form is probably more data rich than anything else. It is very likely contrived. Generally, adult non-standard dialect speakers revert to standard forms in written comms. Usually the only times linguists encounter non-standard dialects in writing is in transcripts, scripts, and children’s writing. It’s clear Pud isn’t a child. So it begs the question: if his use of non-standard dialect is contrived, why?

77. ButtPutty spews: … In psychiatry, the term neologism is used to describe the use of words that have meaning only to the person who uses them, independent of their common meaning…

Describes ButtPutty to a T.

So what kind of psychosis/neurosis leads to this condition? Could it be just too much exposure to Fox News? Or could it be an untreated syphilis infection caused by an intimate encounter with a goat, chicken or other farm animal?

55)The deckhand is the face of the operation, especially since the Captain, by the time passengers are aboard the boat, should already be in the other wheelhouse.(During docking operations, the Captain is the one driving the boat).

I have seen private sector union workers doing a great job too, in recent months. I usually don’t mention what temp work I do, but back in January, I was a road flagger with a company that was contracted by Union Pacific to handle crossing security on a road that paralleled a little industrial spur near E. Marginal Way. After the track gangs vehicles passed our location, we were waiting for them to come back, and I was seeing them put in long workdays. Forget 8, try 10-12, for over a week straight. This was not high speed rail work, but just making it so the 1 or 2 trains a day that serve local customers, don’t derail. Don’t know if these were the same track gangs that were upgrading the UP CHicago-St. Louis line to 110MPH operation that are now having to replace over 100,000 concrete ties, because they were defective.(Warranty is covering the replacement). Still, the project is going forward and they hope to be running a test train on trackage that does not need the tie replacement, at 110MPH this year. Illinois and several other states are in the middle of a joint rolling stock purchase, hoping to get a good deal. Illinois is not just buying rolling stock for increased Chicago-St. Louis service, it’s also for a new corridor in Illinois, restoring service to the Quad Cities, for the first time since the Rock Island quit.

“Most people wouldn’t need a gun to detain a naked man armed with a bottle of rum.”

Dork, that little exerpt was just one of six little news stories that showed having a firearm is sometimes a life-saver and crime-stopper. It’s on page 10 of the June edition of American Rifleman, just in case you’re interested in reading the other five stories.

Frankly, whether Pud is a licensed engineer in the “computer industry” or a janitorial engineer in the “computer industry” there’s nothing particular odd about a limited vocab in this day and age. What fascinates me is his insistent determination to prove the rest of the English speaking world wrong whenever his vocab fails him. He clearly has a very colorful grasp of English grammar and enjoys making up a great many unique homographs and using them liberally (npi) in his posts. More specifically he seems to enjoy using non-standard dialect and seems to do more of it whenever his rhetoric becomes heated or confrontational. In that context it seems to me that Pud’s vocab misuse by frequently and repeatedly “regurgitating” words back at other posters without necessarily understanding them is like a defense mech. I suppose he hopes to defuse the potential power of these words by repeating them back improperly again and again.

Spin spin spin. You love to take definitions and spin them to your own meaning.

janitorial engineer in the “computer industry” get air miles for flying everywhere? Do tell “doc” daneeka since you claim to KNOW everything.

You are so tiresome, puddles, particularly when you think you’ve hit on a winning argument…sorry to tell you…

Miller Freeman was head thug in a pogrom against Japanese-Americans, being the head of the Washington Anti-Japanese League.

Miller Freeman and the thugs like him, not unlike Nazis, played on long-standing ethnic resentment of the majority against a relatively prosperous and easily-identified minority.

Hundreds of thousands of innocent Japanese-American US citizens were rounded up and put in concentration camps, in no small measure due to the agitation of racist, fascist leaders like Miller Freeman.

Those imprisoned US citizens of Japanese descent lost their farms, businesses and homes – their lives and livelihoods were stolen from them, their families shattered, their property expropriated.

Ergo, Miller Freeman stole far more than any land from any particular Japanese-American family, though he is guilty of that as well.

You think you’re being clever by demanding a police blotter or a court conviction – but that’s the point, this horrible crime, perpetrated by Miller Freeman and Klansmen like him (in effect), was a crime against both the particular people being rounded up and shipped to concentration camps, the people having their land and property and belongings stolen from them – and against our democracy as well. And as is typical when the rich and powerful steal from the powerless, no prosecution takes place, and in fact, the thieves are lauded as civic leaders and visionaries.

So puddles, do you want to be part of the mob, or part of the conscience? Do you want to be part of the rock-throwers on Kristallnacht, or do you want to hide and protect Jews? Are you a slave-owner or a conductor on the Underground Railroad? It’s a moral choice, puddles – what does your Bible tell you to do?

First, there is the spacial joke. If Noah, as your Bible literally tells us, had two of every land creature, then logically he had to have Emperor Penguins, two of them, an Antarctic species. The question is obvious – how did they get from Antarctica to Mesopotamia? And back, after the float trip? Either that really didn’t happen (rational), or “a miracle occurred“, begging credulity (irrational).

There is a temporal joke as well here. Velociraptors were biped feathered carnivorous theropod dinosaurs that lived, estimated, about 70-83 million years ago, based on the ages of the rock formations in Mongolia in which they were discovered. They are thought to have been savage hunters, and if confined on a 300-cubit long boat, might be expected to eat other passengers, like the Emperor Penguins (see above). That theropod dinosaurs might have shared accommodations with penguins (aves, evolutionarily descended from theropods!) and humans, is, in paleontologic terms, insane, and can only be entertained if one suspends rational thought, or, in a corollary to suspending rational thought, rejects evolution and science, and embraces a Young Earth Creationism worldview.

I find it worse than filth, and in fact deeply, offensively pathetic and vile, that you cannot bring yourself to stand with President Obama, and good Americans everywhere, and applaud the heroic Japanese-American, Gordon Hirabayashi, who stood up to thugs like Miller Freeman, and to the failure of the US government, and to Klansmen everywhere, when he refused to abide by racist laws that were sending him, and his family, to concentration camps.

All the farmland that ended up in their hands may have been bought buy the Freeman’s, but in modern parlance, receiving stolen property is a crime. The Freeman’s were well aware of how so much land be and available cheap.

All the farmland that ended up in their hands may have been bought buy the Freeman’s, but in modern parlance, receiving stolen property is a crime. The Freeman’s were well aware of how so much land be and available cheap.

Your personal conjecture checkmate. Still waiting for the link checkmate.

Right Puddy. That’s why you’re an idiot. So let’s put your fallacy to the test. I know you hate this and you’ll just scream, “I never said that! What’s that got to do with anything.”

Iago wants Othello’s job. Iago convinces Othello that Desdemona is cheating on him. Iago keeps up the pressure until Othello is pressed to murder Desdemona. In Puddy world, Iago is blameless and gets Othello’s title, property and riches.

So back to the actual world. Freeman hates the Japanese. Freeman is a prominent person who uses the press to stir racist sentiment against the Japanese and helps establish a Left Coast Anti-Japanese Klan. That racist sentiment makes stripping Japanese of their land and sending them to camps acceptable to the general population. I mean they’re dirty savages after all, Mr. Freeman said so. And Mr. Freeman’s an honorable man. When a few return and get some land that Freeman hasn’t already gobbled up in their absence, Freeman stirs the racist pot so those who returned can’t sell crops. Freeman gets the rest of the land from failed farms. In Puddy world, eh, that’s just AOK. Nothing wrong with a lynching or two right? So are you AOK with the actions of the Klan in the south. White farmers ending up with abandoned 40 acres and a mule is cool with you?

@108 We once watched a movie on TBN based on the Ark story. It got a fair amount of humorous mileage from another issue sort of “left open” by the scriptural account, one which I’m a little surprised Bill Cosby didn’t use in his famous “RIIIGHT” monologue. Noah and his family were depicted as spending most of the voyage shoveling tremendous amounts of manure overboard.

Puddy, master of all internet search and self-proclaimed memory of Britanica proportions. Check @33. Unlike your average righty, I can admire a politician for the plurality of his policies while openly detesting other policies. (See St. Reagan vis-a-vis Iran, Lebanon, AIDS research funding…)

How would you describe forcibly taking people off their land so that nothing is grown, taxes aren’t paid, land gets foreclosed or neglected to the point of uselessness?

And clearly you don’t read that which you attempt to refute.

“The government allowed Nikkei to leave the camps and return to the West Coast in 1945. Some chose to move east; those who returned often found their homes vandalized and belongings stolen. They faced a vocal and virulent reception from the usual anti-Japanese crowd, although the support of other neighbors and the undeniable bravery and sacrifice of the all-Nisei 442nd Regimental Combat Team turned the tide of public opinion. Most Nisei (second-generation Japanese Americans) went to college and left farming for other professions.”

Another incident in recent weeks of a public employee going above and beyond, only this time might have broke a rule, happened in Portland. A TriMet bus driver saw somebody in distress, and got off his bus, and came to their aid, breaking up the fight. The bus had not begun it’s route yet, but the driver did radio dispatch what he was doing, and so far, looks like TriMet is not taking disciplinary action. Although I think this would be something that the Amalgamated Transit Union local representing TriMet drivers would be obligated to go to bat for. He saved a life.

Since you seem rooted to iron clad proof and links Pud, demonstrate for us that Kemper Freeman’s holdings were never enhanced as a result of the racist organizations led by, proven fact, his ancestors.

Let me know what you find. I’d even be impressed if you can find another troll who agrees that you’ve “won” this round.

Since you seem rooted to iron clad proof and links Pud, demonstrate for us that Kemper Freeman’s holdings were never enhanced as a result of the racist organizations led by, proven fact, his ancestors.

Not sure if this could be considered illegal campaigning by TALGO, this was passed on by a moderator on a railfan board I post on, about TALGO USA officials stumping in Wisconsin. Two trainsets were ordered to replace Amtrak rolling stock on the Chicago-Milwaukee Hiawatha corridor(I think it is too short, myself, should at least go to Green Bay), and then their were follow on orders expected when the Milwaukee-Madison line was completed. With the latter canceled, TALGO announced they would continue work on the 4 trainsets already under contract(2 more were ordered by the Oregon DOT to protect Willamette Valley services when 2 additional trains are added Seattle-Portland by 2017, the existing 5 Amtrak Cascades TALGO sets would be taxed to the limit without new rolling stock) at the Milwaukee factory would be completed, and then they would pull out. Two trains are going to be mothballed when Walker and the Legislature changed their mind about keeping the 2 trains for the Milwaukee-Chicago line. Layoffs began earlier this year. Now it seems this story from the Caledonian Patch, and an open house at the plant, they may be giving Wisconsin one last chance.

Also canceled was a Kenosha-Milwaukee via Racine commuter train, which I thought should have been a simple extension of an existing Chicago-Kenosha run of Chicago/METRA’s ex-Chicago and Northwestern Union Pacific-Northwest line. Instead it turned into a separate line. On a railfan board, the moderator told me it would have been a Kenosha version of the Trenton Shuffle on the NEC, where commuters taking an alternate route to Amtrak trains on the NEC to NYC from Philadelphia would switch from SEPTA’s R7 line to a New Jersey Transit train to NYC. By the way, somebody tried to steal copper wire from an NJT line, only not from the storage shed, it was live, and the idiot is lucky to be alive.

What I wonder about what TALGO is doing being legal, is they are a foreign company, like most if not all passenger rail rolling stock manufacturers in the US. Perhaps their is a loophole for US-based subsidiaries. Personally, if TALGO is looking for a user, perhaps WSDOT can get a good deal on them, and put some of their first generation Amtrak Cascades trains in reserve, or a second section during busy times on Seattle-Portland. They usually end up getting extra conventional rolling stock from the Amtrak pool during the Thanksgiving Rush, maybe the two Wisconsin trains would be a better use.(Because Amfleet coaches don’t have the tilting technology, they have to take it slower in curves).

Interesting, the TV Critic for the Baltimore Sun, who usually defends FOX News, seems to be changing his tune. This guy is a frequent guest on CNN Reliable Sources, and he did say he got the video from Media Matters.

As for what I have read about the TALGO trains Wisconsin had ordered, and ODOT has ordered and will receive, they look more advanced than what we already have. Although ODOT ordered the two to handle Willamette Valley schedules(2 Eugene-Portland round trips), since some Seattle-Portland trains run through to Eugene and 1 Vancouver B.C.-Seattle round trip runs through to Portland, the ODOT trains will rotate through Seattle every few days. On the Amtrak Cascades trains we have, the rear cab-control car is a converted locomotive, while the new trains have a purpose built car. Not sure if the Locomotives were purchased new for the WI trains, but those would have been built in Idaho, most likely.(MotivePower has the most experience lately building passenger locomotives, and by the way, Sound Transit has an order for a few new ones from them, going to need them for increased service, and the current fleet is due for a mid-life overhaul in a few years).

without lies, Democrats could never get elected. And they’ve become accustomed to getting a pass from the media on their lies, so that anyone who calls them on their constant, routine and habitual lying must be destroyed as an existential threat to the Democratic Party.

janitorial engineer in the “computer industry” get air miles for flying everywhere?

That blockquote was copied directly from one of your posts. You seem to be taking issue with the fact that you copied the “janitorial engineer in the “computer industry”” from somebody else and used it at your subject. That’s important, because you tried to use that derisive term in rebuttal, and added your predicate, “get air miles for flying everywhere?” as a boast.

Whatever the original source for the subject, you reused it with your own predicate in an effort to inflate yourself. That’s the point, dumbshit.

(Please tell me I don’t have to define ‘subject’ and ‘predicate’ for you, I don’t want to have the ‘neologism’ debacle all over again, just because of your poor grasp of English.)

It’s amazing to me, in all earnestness, that puddles can let his blind hatred of his perceived enemies, his inchoate anger towards leftists and Democrats, stand in the way of his ability to condemn a racist pogrom against a defenseless minority population.

He rails at Democrats for exploiting ‘his people’ and keeping them in poverty, on the flimsiest and most tangential of thinking, while at the same time defending the leader of the Washington Anti-Japanese League from criticism.

Miller Freeman made a fortune developing farmland into malls, farmland much of which was appropriated, STOLEN, from Japanese-American citizens who were thrown into concentration camps at Freeman’s behest. That fortuen he passed down to asshole extraordinaire grandson Kemper, and we’re still living with the consequences of that crime.

Not at all. It’s all very, very, very good to be me. Good enough, in fact, that I get to spend a considerable amount of my time these days trying to figure out how to share my good fortune with others. Good enough that I’m very happy to pay my share of taxes, volunteering frequently to pay even more (on my mail-in ballots). My family is well and happy. Everyone’s health is good – although my pops had a struggle with prostate cancer not too long ago, but he came through it all okay. So that leaves me free to focus some concern on the health and wellbeing of those who maybe haven’t been so lucky. Because, really, that’s all it’s been: luck. Just like Kemper Freeman Jr. in a way. He was just lucky that his granddad used some of his publishing fortune to buy a fallow strawberry farm during the war. Although I must say I’m glad that I don’t need to feel any shame about the origins of my good luck. And shame is about the only way to describe the considerable efforts that the Miller Freeman family have put forth over the decades, through their power and influence in publishing and other media, to make sure nobody knows too much or cares too much about where that strawberry farm came from. How nice of you to oblige them, Pud. Keep it up, and maybe they’ll let you clean the pool.

Roger Rabbit Commentary: I’d like to hear Rmoney explain how he’s gonna cut taxes for rich folks who aren’t paying any taxes to begin with. Maybe a wealthy person’s version of the Earned Income Credit?

“Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens took a poke at the controversial Citizens United decision Wednesday night and said his former colleagues have probably already had second thoughts about it. …

“In remarks prepared for delivery at the University of Arkansas, Stevens predicted that the court will soon be forced to issue rulings that will undermine a key part of the Citizens United ruling — that the First Amendment ‘prohibits the suppression of political speech based on the speaker’s identity,’ including the fact that the speaker is a corporation.”

Well…that’s a start now, isn’t it? So sad that you cannot honor a great American hero without either adding an insult, or acknowledging that it was President Obama who conferred the aware, or even mentioning the vile racism of people like Miller Freeman that the hero stood up to.

You didn’t quote me verbatim. I copied doc daneeka so it was not my quote!

Manifestly not true. You took Daneeka’s phrase and made it your own – trying to turn it from an insult into some preening self-congratulation on your part. That was the whole point of my original post.

So sad to see a grown man (or what I assume is a grown man, but I’ve never met puddles) run and hide and deny and spin when all else has failed, all in a vain attempt to avoid acknowledging that he was wrong.

Your vaulted FDR is on record for this and anyone who brings up that fact is attacked just as checkmate is doing now!

First, I think you mean “vaunted”, which means “boast about or praise(something), esp. excessively” (funny you would get that wrong), not “vaulted”, which would suggest he leaped (which he couldn’t) or was launched airborne (which seems…unlikely).

Second, I don’t think any of the rational people here (the leftists) would deny Roosevelt’s complicity, and our deep sadness and shame at such, both in terms of being fellow Americans, and fellow Democrats. I indicated this in my first response to your braying about it all being FDR’s fault. “Sadly, true” I believe I acknowledged.

What seems to trip you up is a discussion of the broader and more complex antecedent events, particularly the vicious and vile racism against Japanese-American US citizens and immigrants that was rampant in this area in a well documented fashion for years prior to WWII. Especially difficult for you seems to be acknowledging that the forebear of one of the areas more prominent Republicans was clearly a leader of the anti-Japanese pogrom, again, for years prior to WWII.

In general, the report noted, it takes a number of credits and deductions for a wealthy person can zero out a tax bill. These can include things like tax-exempt interest, medical deductions and charitable contributions. Some wealthy taxpayers are also likely paid taxes to other countries even if they did not pay them in this country.

Yes, RR, wealthy people who make charitable donations and make tax-exempt investments in our infrastructure sometimes pay no taxes because of it. Because they give to United Way and invest in tax-free bonds which would cost a municipality far more to issue if they were taxable, these people paid no taxes. They support charities and municipalities in need of investment, RR. And it’s not like it was a large percentage of that wealth group. In fact, 0.8% of those wealthy people paid no taxes that year.

Meaning 99.2% of them did, and the vast majority of them paid a shitload.

The article is cherry-picking a very small percentage of a group of wealthy people. What percent of the overall federal income taxes are paid by those making over $200,000 per year is a number you’ll never see RR spewing out on this blog. Doesn’t fit his narrative.

I check news sources on elections in other countries out of curiosity, and one thing I notice about German Politics. When a major party’s preferred coalition partner(it’s rare for a state election in Germany to be an outright majority). The safe route is usually a grand coalition to form a government, even though it could have ramifications for the Chancellor in Berlin. The Upper House of the German Parliament(I won’t try to remember it’s name here) is based on the state governments, so for easy passage of legislation, Chancellor Merkel would prefer to be working with as many state governments that mirror her coalition with the Free Democrats. That meant the recent state election in North Rhine-Westphalia(Cologne, as well as the former capital of Bonn), cost the Chancellor 7 votes in the upper house. Each state is gauranteed a minimum of 3 votes, but the biggest states get as many as 7. The oddest grand coalition is the Social Democrats as the senior partner and Christian Democrats as the junior partner. I just like how leading into Sunday(German Elections are on a Sunday or national holiday), the parties are going at it, then on Monday, the guys with the most votes are looking for a partner.

In Britain, there were local elections recently, Camerons Conservatives took a beating in some areas, including the Greater London Assembly. People in London liked Mayor BOris Johnson, but the Tories, not so much, so he survived. The Tories lost the majority on the assembly, with Labour gaining, and their Green Party allies holding their 2 seats on the council. THe Tories went from 11 to 9, and their Liberal Democratic allies went from 3 to 2.(Like other BLair-era Devolution governments(Scottish Parliament, Welsh, Northern Irish, and Greater London Assemblies), they dumped winner take all for a proportional system, in London’s case, a variant of the German Mixed-Member system, just with no overhang seats(when a party wins more seats than they are entitled to at the district level vs. Party Vote)).

The French Presidential System, while some may disagree with the results, they require that in the first round of voting, all declared official candidates get equal time, no matter how they are doing in the polls, and there were 10 in the first round. Then in the run-off, it’s only the top two.

Now we learn that hundreds of colleges and banks secretly teamed up to gouge and rip off students:

“As many as 900 colleges are pushing students into using payment cards that carry hefty costs, sometimes even to get to their financial aid money, according to a report to be released Wednesday by a public interest group.

“Colleges and banks rake in millions from the fees, often through secretive deals and sometimes in apparent violation of federal law, according to the report, an early copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.”

Roger Rabbit Commentary: The bankruptcy exemption for student loans needs to go. If corporations can rid themselves of union contracts and pension obligations by filing Chapter 11 (which doesn’t even put them out of business; it’s merely a “reorganization”), then students should be able to rid themselves of student loans they can’t repay by filing Chapter 7. What’s good for geese, is good for ganders.

But if the Republican Obstructionists In Congress (TM) won’t get reasonable about this, then let the lawsuits fly! Tens of millions of ex-students filing fraud lawsuits against colleges and banks (which have the deepest pockets around) will provide employment for a whole generation of newly-minted lawyers. If the colleges and banks who prey on students won’t let their victims file for bankruptcy, then let the victims make them file for bankruptcy!

This was an interesting case in the Canadian Province of Alberta last month. The Wildrose Alliance, a party that some might consider a Canadian version of the Tea party, looked set to prevail in the polls leading up to the election. The Progressive Conservatives, which have run the show in Edmonton since the early 1970s, looked like they lost their way. Two things it seems happeened in that last week. 1 was the leader of the Wildrose Alliance not counting on the legend that led the PC Takeover in the 1970s still being around and endorsing his successor following the debate, and 2, Alberta Liberals deciding the Progressive Conservatives were not so bad. Strategic Voting, Liberals voted for the PC, rather than take a chance on winning more seats than they normally do. After the election, one Liberal legislator supposedly said the PCs owe them big. Not saying this will work here, as just like their Federal Government, it’s a parliamentary system(but Single Member, winner take all districts, just like us). What Alberta Premier Allison Redford did, as one columnist put it, united the left and scared the middle. It worked, she got 4 years to prove it was not a mistake.(Majority government plus a fixed election date. BC has the same situation, but bad news for BC Liberal Premier Christy Clarke, the election is the middle of next May, and the Liberals conservative base is losing it, some going back to the BC Conservatives. Partly it’s not her fault, she took over last year after Premier Gordon Campbell quit when his personal approval dropped to 9%.(Should not have endorsed the controversial Harmonized Sales Tax after running against it as a campaign issue in 2009). The HST was defeated in a first ever BC Citizens Initiative led by a former Social Credit Premier who had a few scandals of his own. Former premier Van der Zalm had a plan B if the referendum had failed. Recall. That did not get too far, as it was not needed.

The purpose of college aid programs used to be helping students who worked hard and made grades get an education that would better their lot in life, if they weren’t lucky enough to be born to parents who could pay their way for them.

But in our utterly corrupt society, even that has been prostituted by greedheads who see only dollar signs, in anything that anyone does.

America’s rampant money madness has gone too far. We see that in millions of fraudulent mortgages; in millions of fraudulent foreclosures; in millions of fraudulent student loans; in dozens of fraudulent corporate bankruptcies; in massive tax evasion by the filthy rich; in almost anything you can name, there is rampant and pervasive fraud. America has gone from the “land of the free” to the “land of the fraud.”

We have a good thing in this country, but it’s fragile, and we could lose it, if we’re not more careful than this.

The fundamental underlying cause of America’s student loan crisis is the evisceration of public funding for public colleges, community colleges, and vocational schools by legislatures. Guess which party led the charge to slash public education funding, even as they were passing more tax cuts for the already-affluent?

A few days ago, I read a New York Times article that said the portion of public college funding that comes from state governments has gone from 25% to 7% in just a few years.

Faced with such draconian cuts, public colleges had no choice but to put more financial burden on students, and students had no choice but to borrow more money.

I say let students who can’t get decent jobs bankrupt those loans — and make the predatory lenders who have gotten rich by exploiting poor students eat the losses. There isn’t any other business on earth that doesn’t have to write off a certain percentage of bad accounts as part of the cost of doing business, so why should these lenders be an exception?

Interesting story out of Florida when it comes to passenger rail. Florida East Coast Industries is proposing to run passenger trains from Miami to Orlando via Cocoa Beach(Cape Canaveral area). What makes this different is that it is a private proposal, with little or no public money involved.(On a railfan board, we were discussing potential routes from the Space Coast into Orlando as there is no existing branch. Could possibly be paralelling Florida Highway 528, the Bee Line Expressway). They were planning this for awhile, but went public because they were about to start doing planning people would find out about anyway. I think this one might work, because of who they hired as Vice President of Passnger service development. Eugene Skorpkowski, former director of the Capitol Corridor Joint Powers Authority in California, which ran Amtrak’s Capitol Corridor(San Jose-Oakland-Sacramento with some trains running east to Auburn), turning the service in just a few years from nothing into a powerhouse.

The All Aboard Florida proposal is departure from a railroad that was a victim of hedge funds a few years ago. Fortress Investments bought out both short-line conglomerate RailAmerica and the Florida East Coast railroad, and naturally tried to merge the two different operations. Fortress no longer owns RailAmerica, but seems one decision they made at the time looked like a bad idea. They fired the FEC CEO that made the railroad worth buying. He took ideas he learned when he had worked with Illinois Central and later Canadian National CEO Hunter Harrison, and put them into practice. One of them, was putting freight trains on a regular schedule. He also would work a few days a month in such dirty jobs as switchman and in the cab of the locomotive. He called it “staying grounded”.

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